Denver, Colo.

Disgusting. Simply disgusting. But why should I be surprised that the Bush Administration would erect a farce like this? Why is it so surprising that I actually shouldn't be surprised?

I know, it's because I expect more out of America.

What a horror has befallen us. Certainly, 9/11 was a tragedy, but I think the full spectrum of the horror manifested itself in the aftermath--in the bad intentions, the bad decisions and the bad laws that followed such as these. Does that mean that Osama bin Laden succeeded in destroying America? Does this mean that all it takes is a few airplanes, a few buildings and a few thousand lives to subvert the freedom of millions? Does this mean that where bin Laden left off, Bush picked up?

It's not just the denial of justice for a few people that's at stake here. It's the potential of denial of justice for millions that is being put on display.

America will heal itself of this, though, of this I am very confident. The will of the people in this country is notoriously strong and intrepid. Bush can't push the envelope in a place like the US and expect that millions of Americans won't push back just as hard. The people are already voting and already speaking out. The Spirit of Freedom can only be kept terrified for so long. Bush would be wise to take note of this and start making concessions. Otherwise, worldwide disgrace are in the cards for him the second he leaves office. Of that, I am also confident.

Alzie Rice
02/27/2008 @ 7:24pm

Minneapolis, Minn.

Thanks to Ross Tuttle for bringing these accusations to light.

We should stop tacitly supporting the Bush Administration's neutral terminology about "military tribunals"--which, at best, grants them a certain level of moral ambiguity, just as using the term "harsh treatment" instead of "torture" allows waterboarding to be marginally acceptable to many--and start calling these "trials" what they are.

When Stalinist dictators ran rigged political trials, seeking "justice to serve the party" based on little or no evidence, and with the prosecutor also serving as "defense attorney," we called them "show trials." They were a sham, a bitter parody of justice--and something to be expected of an anti-democratic regime.

The Guantánamo military tribunals are just that--Stalinist show trials. Something to be expected of an anti-democratic regime.

Ted Fitch
02/21/2008 @ 10:27am

New York City, N.Y.

I do not understand the idea of Evil; nor do I trust people who make use of it. I prefer to believe our species has a poorly integrated brain, that we expect too much from ourselves and one another. Baboons do mass murder and ethnic cleansing too.

Enter Pentagon general counsel William Haynes, stepping on the feet of all the arrogant, self-justified moral monsters in the line, pushing his way into the lead, in front of a Neanderthal, J. Fred Muggs.

I want to ask, I confess rhetorically, where these people come from? What did we do, or not do, to have this plague of baboon mimics descend on us, the good guys?

And what do we have to do to be rid of them? Don't tell me we have to evolve, because that hasn't worked so far, and galaxies come and go.

I can think of a few things, but only because I, too, have an unintegrated brain. So I'll try voting for Obama and hope his brain is farther along than that of William Haynes.

Barry Blitstein
02/20/2008 @ 10:52pm

Oak Harbor, Wash.

Mr. Tuttle, I bow in your general direction, you've bright to light the tip of the paternalism that is presently riding shotgun on We, the People like herdsmen, not leaders.

Gitmo shows the absolute horror of the Mechanistic Cosmos. What are we doing to those people, our kin? Same thing we're doing to all of us: Other-Instigated/Self-Inflicted Cellf-Imprisonment. (This is also known as the Buddha's First Noble Truth.)

The APA deliberately chose Newtonian mechanics as its model for psychology, a mistake Robert Oppenheimer warned them not to make. Newtonian mechanics is based on a point particle. Thus, we collapse Psyche into quantum singularities of pain, and then seek to preserve that false and inverted condition as the basis of awareness itself. Psychology as we know it is a Frankenstein's monster; so is society as we know it. Gitmo shows it.

Jose Padilla and the Gitmo prisoners are being installed as icons for crowd control on the control panels of our collective unconscious. Making the enslaved pay for their enslavement, making prisoners imprison themselves, is state of the art in the manufacture of consent.

Where were you when Kennedy's head was rung like a bell by bullets from the same cattle prod that rang Dr. King's bell? Where were you on 9/11?

Where will you be when the next shock comes?

They're using the Shock Doctrine, as brilliantly expounded by a genuine Promethean Sister, Naomi Klein, like a cattle prod. Gitmo is an attempt to show us all what happens when we step out of their line, and into our lives.

Our society offers up deathtraps like Gitmo, the SuperDome and those mobile FEMA gas chambers, as shelter from the storm. There can be no acquittals? This is our method of human sacrifice on industrial scales.

How's this for a plot twist: Uncle Sam spares their lives, instead only imprisoning them forever. How kind, like the Saudi king who "spared" that woman from 200 lashes.

They're using mythic images and narratives, humanity's own greatest boons, as branding irons and razor wire, literally pushing us around like cattle.

But there is release! from this word-bound deathtrap; we all are flowing through.

David Parker
02/20/2008 @ 9:18pm

Boston, Mass.

Great article by Mr. Tuttle. Alarming, but not the least bit surprising.

Chalk up another casualty to the most destructive administration of our time. We've already surrendered freedom and privacy--so what's a little justice - especially if the victims aren't even American (or Christian)?

More mind-boggling policy from imbecilic fear-mongers. Unfortunately, most people will probably be too busy struggling to pay their non-conforming mortgage or massive credit card bills to notice.

Chris Burns
02/20/2008 @ 09:57am